For years, the Brunswick Street Mall has served as a monument to the Fortitude Valley of old.

From Monday, however, the heart of inner city suburb, the last bastion of Valley grunge, will beat to a new rhythm.

A long awaited, $4 million facelift is set to aesthetically transform the tired old dame – and like with any cosmetic rejuvenation, it is hoped she will attract a new class of suitors.

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On a strip long-renowned for its proliferation of bars, nightclubs and cheap takeaway joints, Valley Chamber of Commerce president Robin Maini said it was hoped the Brisbane City Council funded upgrade would signal a shift to a new era of dining and retail traders.

While the mall’s night economy has always flourished, the day economy has lagged, he said.

“The daytime economy is about attracting the right tenants so they will attract the right sector of people,” Mr Maini said.

“Tourists, business people, people who work in the city, they all go to Emporium, James Street or Gasworks.

“I want them here.”

A yet-to-be-named international hotel chain has already been secured to transform the vacant, turn-of-the-century TCB building in the centre of the mall into a four-star boutique hotel, which Mr Maini heralded as a coup for the area.

“That in itself is a very big uplift to that mall,” he said.

“What that will attract will be the new local restaurants and retailers. Nice restaurants and cafes always want to be near nice hotels.”

Inevitably, however, Mr Maini said, the upgrade could spell the end of the tenure of some current tenants.

New aesthetic requirements will be placed on operators following the completion of the project and rents are expected to rise.

“We are not trying to get rid of anyone, it’s just the type of businesses we want to operate are going to be ones that attract a different type of consumer during the day,” he said.

“The way we have laid out the design during the day is much more conducive to upmarket dining and there is a standardisation with three options for outdoor furniture.

“If you have a fast food place that thinks it can get away with cheap plastic outdoor chairs and broken tables, they no longer have that choice.

“If you set a standard and they can meet that standard, we will be glad to have them.

“If they can’t they will have to know that someone else will be glad to take that space.”

Lilgun Ozturk, whose family operates two takeaway stores in the mall, said it was not the completion of the revitalisation but the construction period that worried her and fellow traders.

“We do need it, it should be good because it is really dirty looking,” she said.

“But six months it will be closed, its going to be very bad. We all still have rent to pay and we don’t have any other incomes.”

The mall is not expected to be closed during construction works but day traffic is expected to diminish significantly.

“The upgrade is okay but I’m worried about during the upgrade,” he said.

“They say after the upgrade there will be more business but they can’t guarantee it.”

Mr Lee said he was also concerned the project timeframe would blow out, with the nearby Chinatown Mall upgrade taking nine months.

Key features of the revitalisation project include replacing the current brick paver surface with patterned concrete, the installation of a large wire roof structure and the installation of small retail pods in the centre of the mall.

Some of the existing trees will also be relocated.

One of the primary considerations of the upgrade, Mr Maini said, had always been to gentrify without eliminating the Valley’s creative soul.

So even the name is out.

When the project is completed mid-year, Brunswick Street Mall will be no more.

In its place will be the Valley Creative District.

“The growth of the Valley has been around this one area called the Valley mall, everything is going up around this mall but nothing has happened to this mall,” he said.

“The mall is going to be revitalised with a clean and modern look but to keep that culture of creativity.”

Mr Maini said the project would inevitably attract critics but said once complete, the Valley would have a space that remained true to the inner city suburb’s unique identity.

“It’s going to be funky but cleaner and newer funky,” he said.

“What would people rather have, a nice revitalised Valley with nice places to eat during the day or what everyone’s been complaining about for 25 years?

“It’s a funky, artistic, creative design but there will always be critics.”

38 comments

"Valley Creative District" - really? That's an absolutely horrible name that sounds like it was thrashed out in committee and is a compromise that no-one really liked, but it was 6pm and everyone wanted to go home.

I predict it lasting less than six months.

Commenter

Kate

Location

Brisbane

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 3:45AM

Ha! I guess it means all the binge drinking and bashings of a night can now be classed as 'performance art' instead.

Commenter

Totes Creative

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 8:20AM

A name change is about all 4 million will buy you.... If they wanted to improve the place they'd have spent 10 times that, focused on the whole precinct, not just the mall and council would give permission to resume neglected properties.

Commenter

Bill

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 9:56AM

Creative District? How many businesses in the Brunswick Street Mall fall into the creative category, and it's hardly a district is it - it's a Mall. The name doesn't fit the product. Food court for drunks is the unofficial name of the Brunswick Street Mall.

The rest of the valley has flourished as you have professionals, with some vision working on the projects, unlike a the people involved with the Valley Chamber of Commerce or the Valley Malls Advisory Board, who are mostly protecting their own interests at the detriment of the rest

Commenter

JL

Location

brisbane

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 6:48PM

If you really want to "improve" the valley, start by getting rid of the known trouble spots that peddle in misery (drugs) and violence. Class the area up, dont rely on the nightclubs to pay the rent.

Commenter

scotty

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 7:02PM

Kate, you've hit the nail on the head.

Commenter

Mike

Location

Brisbane

Date and time

January 19, 2014, 8:26AM

"Valley Creative District" must be one of the worst names that could have possibly been given to Brunswick Street Mall. Instead of creating a chance for creativity to thrive they are naming it "creative" and hoping fit the best, whilst stymying the stone of the chances for creativity with a store guide for street furniture, and by increasing the rents so that there is little chance that any small galleries and local boutiques will appear. Making something pretty does not make it more creative, it will probably make it less

Commenter

Karl

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 3:52AM

Exactly what Brisbane needs. More places to have coffee and pay too much for crap you don't need.

Leave the grunge alone!

Commenter

PeterH

Location

Burleigh Heads

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 4:10AM

Hahaha 'Valley Creative District', how embarrassing! As a local worker I'm very pleased to see this disgusting place cleaned up, but really, the name of Brunswick Street Mall wasn't a problem!

Commenter

Owen

Date and time

January 18, 2014, 8:49AM

As long as they demolish all the heritage buildings and leave the area clean and tidy it would be a vast improvement .The valley is grotty, the only good thing about the Good Old Days is that they have gone .We dont need any reminders.